I Have To Do.... WHAT??!!?

So my philosophy of life is this: "Try most things at least once." This way, I'm not locked into anything, but I am constantly exposed to new experiences and situations so I don't miss out on something important that might actually turn out to be a lot of fun. "Massage" turned out to be one of those fun things.

For those of you who have never had the luxury of experiencing a massage from a professional massage therapist, I guarantee you it's not what you imagine it to be. I am one of those poor, unfortunate souls who have issues with people "touching" them (read: I don't like it and avoid it whenever possible) from either negative experiences during my formative years, or mind-programming mostly using my own imagination... in any case, there was "no way, no how" I was going to go and pay some stranger to put their hands all over my body. NOOOOOO way!

However, circumstances conspired to put me in a place where I began to consider trying massage "at least once," per my previously stated rule. I talked to my friends that had received massages before, and they all assured me "Oh, you are going to LOVE it!" all the while I am thinking in my head, yea, sure, of COURSE you would say that - but I am absolutely positive I won't "love" it. I especially didn't think I would love it when, in the course of my research, I found out that to properly be massaged you have to be naked (yes, as in "no clothes on" whatsoever) - the only thing standing in the way of you and this stranger is one thin sheet. Where is that phrase I used earlier? Oh yes: NO WAY, NO HOW!

So here's what REALLY happened: I walked into the office at the appointed time. The massage therapist - a young, soft-spoken black girl in her mid-twenties - walks me back to the massage room. There are pictures of tropical fish on the walls, and on one side a wall mural depicting an under water seascape, complete with dolphins. Smiling dolphins, no less. There are three or four small lamps on the far counter (they look like rocks and glow from within when you turn them on), and there is a small portable radio playing soft music. She instructs me to disrobe - there are hangers so my clothes don't get all wrinkled - and to lay down between the two sheets covering the massage table, face down (for those of you who have never seen a massage table, it is constructed in such a way where your face can see through an opening where your head is supposed to be faced down - Google "massage table" for a picture - worth a thousand words). So I get ready, I hear a gentle knock on the door, she comes back in and gets immediately to work: kneading, rolling, percussion, compression (all big "massage" words) - and I am just chatting non-stop, like I am sitting in the salon getting my hair done. If she needed a limb, she would simply uncover it and work out all the kinks, then stick it back under the sheet and move on to some other body part. I never felt uncomfortable, or self-conscious, or otherwise violated in any way. In fact, I would tell her at various stages "Hey?!!? That feels good? What are you doing?" I could literally feel my muscles and tendons moving around beneath my skin as she worked to loosen them up. It was quite an experience. I remember talking with someone a few weeks earlier about this idea of getting a massage, and to my thought that it was "too intimate" he told me "No, it's theraputic.." And that's exactly the right word to describe it: theraputic.

I was happily suprised to discover I am not "the ball of nerves" I originally thought I was; all my stress is in my neck and shoulders (probably with all the hours I spend hunched over my laptop!). I told the massage therapist she would definately be seeing me again in her lifetime. Am I still a little sketchy about people touching me? Maybe. But the benefits of massage definately outweigh the sketchiness, and I have a real experience to file in my memory banks to destroy all my previous misinformed notions.

The secret to a happy and fulfilled life: "Try most things at least once."